We are an organization dedicated to raising awareness about the history, culture and true lives of Romani people worldwide.
We confront racism and oppression wherever we encounter it.
We try to make connections with all the "isms" that make up western culture.

Savvy Chavvy, a group of internet savvy Roma/Traveller youth in England won the UK Catalyst Award for projects using technology to benefit their community. Gordon Brown personally commended the group yesterday.

The young Roma/travellers chose to use the word chavvy, meaning youth in Romanes, in part because of the derogatory slang meaning the word has taken in recent years. The youth are reclaiming the word, much the way Lesbians and Gay men have reclaimed the term queer. It is the prerogative of an oppressed group to reclaim their words which have been used against them.

In response to a media question, youth from Savvy Chavvy stated that their site is a place where they can be themselves without being subjected to the racist epitaphs they are frequently subjected to.

I have received a wonderful response to postings on the artwork of Dina Babbitt. I am encouraging all to do everything possible to see that Ms Babbitt, who is 86 and suffering from cancer, receive back her paintings.I'm still amazed when I write that. What are we fighting for. The paintings are Ms. Babbitt's. There is no dispute there. The Auschwitz Museum has been showing reproductions all along. WHY AREN'T THESE PAINTINGS BEING RETURNED TO THEIR ACKNOWLEDGED CREATOR AND RIGHTFUL OWNER ?

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

I had so much I wanted to write about today, but I was rendered speechless after receiving an e-mail from the daughter of Dina Babbitt, who is 86 years old, a Holocaust survivor and recovering from cancer surgery. I hope you are familiar with the trials of Ms. Babbitt. (Please see articles and references on this blog)

Her daughter thanks us for supporting her mother, when in reality, it is us, the Rromani community, and survivors of the Holocaust, Porraimos in the Romani language, who thank her for her unwavering support for the Roma. It is easy to support people when there is little risk. Ms Babbitt supported us in Auschwitz under the very eyes of Joseph Mengele.

I have no words to express my respect and thanks to Ms Babbitt.

Please let's all do what we can to return her portraits of the Roma in Auschwitz to her.

Are Central and Eastern European countries so rich they can afford to marginalize millions of people?

by S. Adam Cardais

Posted on 28 July 2008

PRAGUE All too often in Central Europe the desperation of the region's Romani population remains shamefully removed from public scrutiny in ghettos hidden far outside capitals such as Prague or Bratislava.

But travel south through the Balkans to Podgorica, where near-toddlers clutch at the arms of tourists and beg for change, or Sarajevo, where shrouded, frail Romani women circulate with their children – hands extended – through the cafes in the Turkish Old Town. This screams the despair of joblessness, poverty, and illness rampant among Central and Eastern Europe's approximately 4 million Roma. The same despair countries such as the Czech Republic try to marginalize – if not cloak – through what one Prague-based human rights worker calls "tacit apartheid."

The near total societal exclusion of Roma – often referred to as Gypsies – in Western and Eastern Europe has received much attention recently, most notably from the "Decade of Roma Inclusion" initiative launched by nine central and southeast European governments in 2005 to foster integration. Yet, as any traveler through the Balkans would easily see, Roma are hanging on the desperate margins. Furthermore, Italy's recent decision to begin fingerprinting Roma after protests earlier this year reveals the depth of subterranean anti-Roma sentiment in Europe.

Given the considerable attention, and the billions of euros in European Union aid money at the "Decade of Roma Inclusion's" disposal, why so little progress? It's not a lack of ideas or funding, say Roma integration experts. It's not even that Roma are work shy, an oft-espoused theory among inclusion skeptics. No, experts say, the problem is weak political will.

Yet keeping Roma in the depths should be unacceptable in modern Europe. Not only is it unjust and immoral – it's bad economics.

TAXPAYERS' BURDEN

"Poverty is expensive," says Gwendolyn Albert of Peacework, an international human development organization. "That's what most people don't realize."

Indeed, Roma exclusion has significant economic costs that should be shouted in arguments supporting integration. It might be a cynical approach, but it might also have the political legs that moral considerations seem to lack.

The costs start with jobs. Either because of discrimination or lack of education or skills, Roma unemployment is disproportionately high in Central and Eastern Europe, reaching 70 percent in some countries.

At the same time, majority populations are advancing toward wheelchairs faster than tricycles. Labor markets will be short tens of thousands of workers in the coming decades, so smart governments should be trying to capitalize on their inexpensive, available Romani work force. But most aren't. Instead, countries such as the Czech Republic are recruiting foreign workers to fill the gaps.

"To bring people from Mongolia to northern Bohemia or northern Moravia, where you have a lot of unemployed Roma, is absurd," Albert says.

Especially so when considering that joblessness lands most Roma on social welfare. A 2003 report by the UN Development Program found that up to 70 percent of Roma in Central and Eastern Europe derive their income from state transfers such as child allowances and unemployment benefits. This social dependency is costly, clearly, but then consider that many low-income Roma don't pay taxes to support these programs and the costs of exclusion are clear: countries lose workers, public money, and tax revenue.

Measuring these costs is difficult because reliable figures on Roma are scarce. The UNDP's are the most recent, and they cover only Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia. But economists Luchezar Bogdanov and Georgi Angelov have calculated Bulgaria's exclusion drain.

In a 2007 study for the Open Society Institute's Sofia office, the researchers found that over 10 years Bulgaria would gain the equivalent of 7 billion to 16 billion euros from full integration and that the return on investment would outweigh the cost by a ratio as high as 3-to-1.

The path to realizing the ambitious goal of "full integration" throughout the region has to start with structured, coherent policy reform that leaps beyond mere awareness to improving education and health care in Romani communities, experts say. Gabriela Hrabanova, a member of the Czech government's Council for Roma Community Affairs and half Romani herself, says the Roma Teacher Assistance program, which trains teachers to better work with Romani children, is a model project.

Unfortunately, she and others says, both Brussels and regional governments' integration efforts are unfocused, with more emphasis placed on drafting action plans than building meaningful grassroots programs. The EU Roma Policy Coalition, a grouping of advocacy organizations, came to a similar conclusion regarding the EU's 2 July agenda for tackling exclusion, saying it laid the onus on member states while failing to propose a single meaningful European strategy.

The coalition is hoping for real progress at the EU High Level Conference on Roma in September. Many arguments for Europe walking the talk on integration will no doubt be made there.

Maybe someone will swallow the attendant cynicism and make the economic argument. It might just prod leaders into action.

Dinah Gottliebova Babbitt was a young Jewish inmate at Auschwitz. When it was discovered that she was an artist, she was ordered by Joseph Mengele to paint the portraits of Gypsy prisoners. In his attempt to "aryanize the Roma", he wanted more realistic representations of their skin tones than cameras could capture. He's the same guy who injected dye into the eyes of Gypsy twins to turn their dark eyes blue. Something NPR once referred to as "the benign Gypsy twin eye study". Dinah developed a relationship with the Roma, especially with one young woman (see photo).

After the liberation of Auschwitz, several of Dina's portraits were found. Since that time, those paintings have been held by the Auschwitz museum. To this day, they have refused to return the paintings to Dina. It's a long story and I'll leave it to the following article to present it.

What I want to say is that one of the reasons the museum states in its refusal to return Dina's work to her is absolutely false and exploitative to the Roma. They have stated that one reason to not return the pictures is that it is evidence of the persecution of the Roma.Dina's portraits do document the horror of Auschwitz for the Roma. As does Dina's heart and soul. THE COPIES of the works of art are sufficient. That is all that has EVER been exhibited at the museum.

Please do not exploit a woman who gave her soul to her Romani fellow prisoners. And especially not in our name.

I keep trying to get the link to a great article written by Dina's daughters. I'm having some problems so in the mean time I'll give you her webpage.http://www.dinababbitt.com

For your information, there is a great interview with Dina in a movie PORRAIMOS where I first became acquianted with Ms Babbitt.

Friday, July 25, 2008

After reading THE SHOCK DOCTRINE, I found my copy of THE SEARCH FOR THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE, the first book I read about the infamous CIA mind control experiments. These experiments were done primarily on mental "patients" but also on unknowing agents themselves. Very interesting reading. And totally relevant today.

Power and control........Doesn't it all come back down to that ?

Interestingly, settled Sinti in Italy are also being subjected to the racist census, despite rationalizations by the government that these measures are meant only to identify "illegal immigrants". (how I hate that term). Sinti are a tribe of Roma who are found mostly in Germany and Italy. My mother's family was Sinti. 2/3rd's of the Sinti in Europe were murdered by Nazis and sympathizers.Most of the Sinti remaining in Italy have survived there for generations and many are 'settled', meaning living in one place.

Yet the "census" goes on.

I am especially appalled at the corroboration of the Italian Red Cross in this "census" of Roma. So far reports are varying on the behavior and process of the Red Cross in the camps.We'll see....

I just finished reading Naomi Klein's book THE SHOCK DOCTRINE. THE RISE OF DISASTER CAPITALISM and I recommend it to all.

Through impeccable research Klein explores the motivations and tactics behind America's foreign policy, from the overthrow of Salvador Allende to the occupation of Iraq.

I was especially impressed with Klein's chapter on the CIA mind control experiments on mental patients (prisoners) of the 1950's and the present day torture of prisoners. The techniques are the same, an attempt to completely breakdown a personality and then recreate it as desired.
She goes further explaining how the same strategy of shock, destroy and rebuild can be used against an entire people/economic/political system.

Naomi Klein convincingly equates the policies of the CIA and shock Doctor Ewen Cameron with the economic policies of Milton Friedman.

The Romanian Government is expressing outrage at the treatment of Roma in Italy.

The majority of Roma immigrants in Italy come from Romania.

The interesting question is why are there so many Roma from Romania fleeing to Italy. How bad must conditions be in Romania when being despised by Italians, discriminated against in all areas of life, put into barbed wire enclosed "camps", and being condemned for begging while being denied jobs seems preferable.Roma in Romania are still being subjected to racist pograms and denied access to jobs, education and social services.SUSPINO : A CRY FOR ROMA is a film made in 2002 about these very issues. It follows the plight of one young Roma family in Italy who fled Romania in the hopes of a better life.The movie not only accurately portrays the situation in Italy but also explores the conditions in Romania which led to this exodus of Roma.Amazingly, SUSPINO could have been made today.

Last month Ruth Greenglass died. Greenglass, together with her husband, testified against Ethel and Julius Rosenberg in their 1950's espionage case.It has long been believed that the Greenglasses, after confessing to their own involvement in a scheme to smuggle atomic secrets to the Soviets, lied under oath to save their own skins. And they succeeded. While both Ethel and Julius were executed, David Greenglass served only 10 years in prison and Ruth was never charged.

Yesterday a judge ruled that much of the 'secret' testimonies in the Rosenberg case would finally be released. One of the few exceptions is the testimony of David Greenglass who is 86 years old.

In a media interview, Greenglass said that he made up the account about the typewriter (this testimony was considered vital to the conviction of Ethel Rosenberg) to protect his wife and that she may have improvised the tale to appease prosecutors.

I hope they release the secret testimony of Ruth Greenglass. Remember, she's dead.

Monday, July 21, 2008

The other day 2 young Roma girls drowned on a beach in Italy. They had been selling trinkets with their cousins.Photos were taken of Italians continuing their sunbathing right by the bodies of the two children.

Italian attitudes towards the country's Roma population were in the spotlight again today after holidaymakers were photographed continuing to sunbathe close to the bodies of two drowned girls from the minority group.Who are Italy's Roma?

An estimated 150,000 Roma, or Gypsies, live in Italy, many of them in encampments on the edges of cities such as Rome and Naples. Some of the camps are unofficial and badly rundown.

The Roma are a distinct ethnic and cultural group with their origins in northern India. They have lived throughout Europe, particularly in the centre and south, for many centuries.

Just over 40% of the country's modern Roma, including an estimated 30,000 descended from 15th-century settlers, ossess Italian passports. The rest are more recent arrivals, many coming from Balkan nations during the 1990s.

After Romania joined the EU at the start of 2007, an estimated 10,000 Romanian Gypsies came to Italy, forming part of a Romanian population in the country believed to total about 500,000.What are public attitudes in Italy to the Roma?

Many people are openly hostile to the Roma, accusing them – especially the newer arrivals – of avoiding work in favour of theft and other crime and shutting themselves off from mainstream Italian society in squalid, illegal camps. Rights groups working with Roma people say they face severe discrimination, some of it tied to more general anti-Romanian and anti-immigrant feeling.

One recent newspaper survey found 68% of people wanted all Italy's Gypsies expelled, whether or not they held Italian passports. Another poll said more than three-quarters of people want unauthorised camps demolished.

In May, a mob of vigilantes torched a Roma camp in Naples after the arrest of a young Gypsy woman accused of trying to abduct a child.How has the Italian government acted?

His election campaign promised a severe clampdown on "Roma, clandestine immigrants and criminals" and his coalition's candidate for mayor of Rome pledged the expulsion of "20,000 nomads and immigrants who have broken the law".

Other politicians have gone further. The head of the rightwing, anti-immigrant Northern League party, Umberto Bossi, argued the attack on the Naples camp was understandable, saying: "People are going to do what the political class cannot."What is the government proposing?

Berlusconi's interior minister, Roberto Maroni of the Northern League, caused controversy last month by proposing a plan to fingerprint all Roma living in camps, including children.

He said this would make it easier for authorities to identify child beggars and remove them from their parents, as well as to expel illegal residents.What has been the reaction to this?

Italian civil liberties groups have expressed outrage, with one Jewish community leader saying the measure could eventually lead to "exclusion from schools, separated classes and widespread discrimination". Earlier this month, the European parliament voted to urge the Italian government against the measure.

However, Italy's legal system has already indicated there is nothing to stop discrimination against Roma. In a ruling handed down earlier this year, but only recently reported, the country's highest appeal court ruled in the case of six people accused of anti-Gypsy racial propaganda that it was acceptable to single out Roma on the basis that they are thieves.

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Well, today has been a very confusing day newswise. The Seattle Post Intelligencer published an article saying that the Rome officials don't plan to fingerprint Gypsies. Internet sources said the exact opposite. Finally it became clear that the census of Roma in Italy will continue as planned but presently plans for fingerprinting all Roma has been put on hold.

The Italian Red Cross, which has been criticized for collaboration in this racist program, has declared that they only want to identify "these people" so we can help them.

Friday, July 18, 2008

I have included the entire article below written by The European Roma Rights Council addressing the recent court settlement in favor of Croatia. 14 Roma children brought suit against the policy of segregating Roma in separate schools. This is a prevalent policy throughout Eastern Europe and a blatant example of the discrimination against Roma

18 July 2008, Budapest, Zagreb: In a setback for Roma rights, the European Court of Human Rights yesterday ruled that Croatia's segregation of Roma children in separate classes does not breach European human rights standards.

The judgment in the case of Oršuš and Others v. Croatia held that the applicants – 14 Romani children attending primary school – were not subjected to discrimination in access to education. As a result, the Court found no violation of Article 3 (prohibition against inhuman and degrading treatment) or Article 2, Protocol 1 (right to education) of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), in connection with Article 14 (non-discrimination), or of Article 13 (effective domestic remedy). The Court found that the government of Croatia had violated Article 6(1) of the ECHR (right to due process and fair trial) as the proceedings before the Constitutional Court in Croatia lasted more than four years. The application was filed by the European Roma Rights Centre, in partnership with the Croatian Helsinki Committee and Croatian attorney Lovorka Kusan.

The applicants, born between 1988 and 1994, had in the past and at the time of the submission to the European Court still attended, segregated Roma-only classes in what are otherwise mainstream primary schools in the Croatian villages of Macinec, Podturen and Orehovica in the Međimurje County. In December 2004, the applicants turned to the European Court claiming that their placement in the Roma-only classes stemmed from a blatant practice of discrimination based on their ethnicity by the schools concerned, reinforced by pervasive anti-Romani sentiment of the local non-Romani community. The applicants further claimed that the school curriculum in the Roma-only classes was significantly reduced in scope and volume as compared to the officially prescribed teaching plan, which resulted in lower quality education. As a result of their segregation, the applicants suffered severe educational, psychological and emotional harm, damage to their future educational and employment opportunities, as well as stigmatization.

The evidence presented to the European Court, based on data provided by the Međimurje County Office of Education, Culture, Information, Sport and Technical Culture, indicated that in school year 2000/2001 all primary schools in the County had a total of 4 577 pupils of whom 865 or 18% were Romani. Even though Romani pupils comprised only a small number of the total primary school population at the county level, an overwhelming number of them - 59.07% - ended up in the segregated classes for the Roma only.In school year 2001/2002, based on official government statistics, in the primary schools in Macinec and Kuršanec as many as 83.33% and 88.49% of all Romani students respectively continued attending separate classes for the Roma only.

Savelina Danova, Acting Director of the ERRC, said, "It is a regrettable fact that the Strasbourg Court missed a crucial opportunity to reaffirm that racial segregation of Roma in schools throughout Europe will no longer be tolerated."

Ivo Banac, President of the CHC, stated, "Now that Croatia has adopted an anti-discrimination law banning segregation, we call on the Croatian government to ensure that this ban is enforced with respect to the education of Romani children in MeđimurjeCounty."

The Court ruled there was not "sufficient evidence that there existed a prevalent prejudice … to attain the level of suffering necessary to fall within the ambit of Article 3 of the Convention" notwithstanding documentation of the psychological impact of segregation on the applicants, and statistical evidence showing the significantly lower chances of finishing primary school of Roma pupils as compared to their non-Roma peers.

The Court also rejected the applicants claim' of discriminatory treatment in violation of Article 14, on the grounds that "in the present case the difference in treatment was based on adequacy of language skills" and that the practice of separating Romani children "allowed for a change from a separate class to a regular class without formalities". The applicants maintained that their language deficiency was never substantaited, moreover segregation can never be an appropriate response to language deficiency.

In its description of the facts of the case in the judgment, the Court did not reflect evidence about key facts pointing to the racist motives underlying the segregation of the Romani children, including:

The fact that the applicants had no knowledge of their Croatian language ability being tested upon enrolment as there was no formal decision or other documentation communicated to them in this regard at that time; the claim that the separation was necessary due to the applicants' poor command of the Croatian language was introduced by the Government only when the case had been filed before the domestic courts; all of the applicants received good grades in Croatian language in the course of their studies;

Widely publicised anti-Romani protests by non-Romani parents in 2002 and 2003 which resulted in the abandonment of official plans by the then Ministry of Education and Sports to move the Romani children into mainstream classes;

The victimisation of the applicants throughout the entire process of the case, which resulted in many of the plaintiffs refusing to be involved in proceedings at the European level and one of the applicants dropping out of the case before the ECHR;

Evidence of harassment of the Croatian Deputy Ombudsman who condemned the practice of school segregation in the Međimurje County; the retraction in the course of the domestic proceedings of the 2000 Croatian Ombudsman report which confirmed the school segregation of Romani children in the Međimurje County and which had already been adopted by the Croatian Parliament; and

Numerous reports from 2001 forward regarding the continuing existence of school segregation of Romani children in Croatia by international institutions and nongovernmental orgganisations, including the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the Council of Europe European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI), the European Commission, the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC), the US State Department, Amnesty International (AI), and the Roma Education Fund (REF).

Speaking on the occasion of the judgment, Viktoria Mohacsi, Member of the European Parliament and ERRC Board Member, stated: "I feel sorry as a member of the Romani community witnessing the political sphere in Europe . This judgment reveals that, even in the European Court of Human Rights, evidence presented by Roma regarding anti-Romani motivations is not taken seriously. Nowhere in this judgment did the court deal with clear evidence of anti-Romani protests by non-Romani parents as well as the continuous victimization of persons involved in this case. I question the level of proof required of Roma to establish discrimination cases before officials."

The European Roma Rights Centre is an international public interest law organisation which monitors the human rights situation of Roma and provides legal defence in cases of human rights abuse. For more information about the European Roma Rights Centre, visit the ERRC on the web at http://www.errc.org/

The following is from a newspaper item placed by American Apparel:2 July 2008

"....Over 12 million human beings have become integral to our society, economy and culture here in the USA, yet they do so in legal purgatory. While no serious political voice calls to send them back to their previous home countries, very few have the courage to admit that the only realistic option is some form of legal integration, coupled with a legitimate, forward-thinking immigration policy.

Migration and economic experts generally agree that the productivity and hard work of immigrants improves the economy and makes goods more affordable and available to US workers. Immigrants not only increase the wealth of the nation, they have contributed significantly to major scientific, medical and industrial advancements, as well as to the arts....

...At what point are we going to recognize that the statusquo amounts to an apartheid system? At what point will America stop living in a state of denial?

At American Apparel we support our workers. We support our community. We support Los Angeles....

...Enough is enough. It is time to Legalize LA, and Legalize the USA."

This is a pretty powerful statement from a US corporation.

American Apparel has a history of treating their workers pretty well. Pay starts at double minimum wage. It's ashame that the CEO, Dov Charney has a history of sexual harassment of female employees, including three law suits, two of which were settled out of court and one pending.

Yesterday, Italian Minister of the Interior, Maroni, expressed anger over the European Parliament's condemnation of his program of fingerprinting Roma.

Defense Minister, La Russa, who is also chairman of the right wing National Alliance Party said that the demands of the European Parliament make him laugh. He then "laughingly" suggested that all Italians be fingerprinted.

There has been a show of support for the Roma in Italy from the European Union and international human rights groups. All are condemning the Italian government's program of fingerprinting all Roma in Italy. They have commented on the similarities between this action and fascistic policies of the not too distant past.

Roma organizations worldwide have been loudly protesting the fingerprinting.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

There has been a show of support against the fingerprinting of Roma in Italy. The European Union is demanding an accounting of the program, thousands have signed the petition condemning the targeting of any group based solely on racial lines. (You can sign the petition--see sidebar) On Sunday 6 July 2008, hundreds of people participated, in Rome, in a protest against the fingerprinting.

People across Europe are protesting this fascistic tactic in the assault on Roma and immigrants.How do we interest the people in the United States.

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FLAG OF THE ROMA

LOLO DIKLO : RrOMANI AGAINST RACISM

Lolo Diklo : Rromani Against Racism is an organization dedicated to providing information about the true situation of the Romani (Gypsies) in the world today. We are committed to confronting racism and oppression wherever it is found.

BACKGROUND

The Romani are a people who are not very well known. We are an ethnic group of people originally from India. We left India and arrived in Europe sometime in the 1300's. There are many theories as to why we left India. This is the work of academics, and we have some. Most Romani are more concerned about daily survival to worry about documentation of our past. We know who we are.

What is known about the Romani is, for the most part, stereotypically based. We are portrayed as romantic, carefree wonderers or child stealers, pick pockets and beggers.

Today the Romani of Europe face the same discrimination they have faced for centuries.